Electrocardiographic Changes Occurring with Advancing Age

Abstract

Some eight years ago, an experimental community hypertension screening programme was started in the Province of Liège (Belgium) [1]. In order to make the best use of this experiment, it was decided to include an electrocardiogram in the screening examination. The present paper reports on the first 43,809 tracings and analyses the electrocardiographic changes occurring with advancing age. Three main problems will be successively envisaged:

1)

What are the electrocardiographic abnormalities showing an age-related increase of frequency?

2)

What are the clinical features most frequently associated with these electrocardiographic findings?

3)

What are the prognostic implications of these electrocardiographic anomalies, especially when they are disclosed in individuals without apparent heart disease?